1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for image forming, and more particularly to a method and apparatus for image forming that is capable of effectively performing an image fixing.
2. Discussion of the Background
Conventionally, a fixing mechanism used for an electrophotographic image forming apparatus is provided with a heater. The heater is generally applied with a commercial AC (alternating current) power source and also an auxiliary power supply using a chargeable power supply such as an electric double layer capacitor. This is an attempt to make a quick rise of the heater possible as well as to increase an energy saving effect.
Such an image forming apparatus that uses a capacitor having a relatively large capacitance as an auxiliary power source can quickly supply a relatively large current to the fixing mechanism so as to be able to avoid degradation in image fixing when a power supply based on the AC commercial power source to the fixing mechanism is in short. However, after discharging the electric power to the fixing mechanism, a relatively large amount of electric power needs to be charged to the capacitor from the commercial AC power source and therefore it becomes not possible for the image forming apparatus to perform image forming at the same time. Thus, a downtime of the image forming apparatus is generated and consequently a user convenience is degraded.